A Geography of Reading

"It is by reading novels, stories, and myths that we come to understand the world in which we live." -Orhan Pamuk

The Rich Landscape of Writing in Outerborough Blues

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What happens when an MFA writes genre fiction? With all the flack writing programs get for producing uniform voices, you might think the two are antithetical. But when Andrew Cotto used his MFA from The New School to write Outerborough Blues he brought the skills of a trained writer to the conventions of a mystery novel.

Because this literary/genre divide is sometimes fightin’ territory for writers from both camps, let’s get a couple of things out of the way first so you know where I’m coming from.

Do you need an MFA to write well?

Of course not. Everyone’s definition of good writing is different, but I believe to write well you need careful attention to the words that are your tools. Studying for an MFA gives you time to consider those tools and the effect to which you use them, but there are loads of great non-MFA writers and some of them (Jonathan Lethem is a favorite) could be considered genre writers.

What is genre fiction anyway?

The distinction between genre fiction and literary fiction usually breaks down to plot driven versus character driven. There are all kinds of genres (mystery, fantasy, science fiction) and I really don’t like to draw too many lines, but sometimes putting a name to something lends easy description.

The richness of Outerborough Blues

I can see Cotto’s MFA in this book in some very positive ways. These are a few things I do not expect to see (but am always grateful for) in a mystery novel.

Strong characters

If I told you the catalyst of the story is the moment a beautiful woman walks into the bar where Caesar Stiles works, I would not be doing this story justice. Stiles is no Bud White (especially not the film version) and he’s got a lot more on his mind than helping this moll. His relationships with his family and the other characters in the story are multifaceted and this gives the novel depth.

Strong sense of theme

The title “Outerborough Blues” has a subtle musical element that could be fleshed out or it could be left unexplored. Cotto develops the musical theme with “Slow, flowing progressions in a melancholy key” in two notable ways. One is the way the narrator overlays the sounds of the neighborhood with the music on his stereo. The second is the way the stories about his past relationships build like verses of a song.

Evocative sentences

A writer with control over his or her tools has the ability to set a scene with a very few words. Here are some of Cotto’s sentences that do just that:

  • “The lady in the liquor store sold me a fifth of whiskey and the landlord’s name without taking her eyes off the book she was reading.”
  • “My boot pulverized broken vials on the cracked sidewalk.”
  • One character describes the evolution of the neighborhood as “Milk and honey turned to malt liquor.”

Layered stories

Outerborough Blues tell several stories at once. This could be cacophonous, but Cotto gently layers the tales of family relationships, gentrification, and the mystery at hand that they become as inextricably linked as any real life. As the aspects of the story unfold over the reader, you are exposed to more and more aspects of the story and the community it takes place in. All in 200 pages.

Is there really a difference between genre and literary fiction?

Cotto reinforced for me something I learned while studying for my MFA at Goddard College (one of the MFA programs which prides itself on welcoming genre writers): good writing is not at all limited by genre. Some people want really well described characters. Some want fast, tight plots in rich worlds. Good writing happens in both camps and great writing blurs the lines between them. Cotto has done just that.

If this review made you want to read the book, pick up a copy of Outerborough Blues from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Sex and Death in the American Novel

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sex and death in the american novel - sarah martinez

I’ve been thinking a lot about bravery this week and about commitment to one’s art. It all started at the book launch party for Sex and Death in the American Novel. The book’s author, Sarah Martinez, had invited Maureen O’Donnell to perform a belly dance to the music of Marilyn Manson that had inspired Martinez while writing her novel. I thought it was going to be ridiculous. But then I watched O’Donnell dance. By committing fully to the dance and her character, she transformed from a tiny Goth girl with plastic horns into an arachnoid creature who kept the audience rapt.

The Artist’s Way

Sex and Death in the American Novel speaks to the myriad ways we come to and commit to our art and ultimately ourselves. Jasper is the wunderkind who was swept into the accepting arms of the writing world and never stopped for a moment to reflect. Tristan is the writer who could never get past his struggles. And Vivi did everything she could to avoid becoming a “Writer” only to find she had done just that. In Vivi’s case, all that she lacked was the acceptance of herself and of her gift.

Every artist I know is on a different path to the greatness within. None of them will achieve lasting fulfillment without that self-acceptance.

Martinez’s greatest success is disentangling the complex fabric of emotions each character is feeling. She understands the push-pull of shame and desire in art and love, and her characters strive to create the relationships that are right for them regardless of societal norms. And of course those norms are also what artists have to question and redefine on their way to personal greatness.

Explicit Content Ahead

The book follows Vivi’s struggle to be as strong and fulfilled as she can, and at times she seeks that fulfillment in sex. Martinez is not shy about describing those sexual encounters and she explores a wider range of erotic possibilities than many people will encounter in life.

One of the things I admired about this book is how Martinez conveyed both the physical and emotional complexities of a ménage à trois. She enticingly wrote the encounters between her characters so that the reader is able to experience—in vivid detail—even the most unfamiliar acts right along with Vivi. The play-by-play narration which can be too much in scenes of daily life lends itself perfectly to introducing the reader to a new world of possibilities.

Anyone who reads Fifty Shades of Grey and finds it misogynistic might enjoy the sex positive attitude in Sex and Death in the American Novel instead.

On Writing About (and Becoming) a Fulfilled Woman

I’ve been reading a lot about women and sexuality as I work on my next novel. A.S. Byatt taught me to love my body. Dorothy Allison helped me question my relationship with Feminism. And Slavenka Drakulić revealed for me new depths in the relationship between mother and daughter. In Sex and Death in the American Novel, Sarah Martinez showed me how to write fearlessly about subjects that terrify me. Each of these authors is giving me strength as I commit to writing the next book as bravely as I can.

If this review made you want to read the book, pick up a copy of Sex and Death in the American Novel from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Wideman Investigates West Philadelphia from the Outside

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Philadelphia Fire John Edgar WidemanIn the novel Philadelphia Fire by John Edgar Wideman, Cudjoe, has returned to Philadelphia to find answers about a horrific event that happened on Osage Avenue in 1985. By withholding the bare facts of the case, Wideman puts the reader alongside Cudjoe as he searches for information and insight in an insular neighborhood.

Interestingly, in the first half of the novel the narrator has significantly more information than he is coherently conveying to the reader. As does Cudjoe. The novel begins in a dense style where the reader is trying to gain some bearing of what’s going on. The language is richly descriptive, but there are few facts to ground the narrative so the reader floats through a phantasmagoria. The flap copy and title clearly refer to a fire, but the first sentence is, “On a day like this the big toe of Zivanias had failed him.” The action is taking place in Mykonos and the fire isn’t even mentioned until page 7 with the cryptic nursery rhyme, “Ladybug, Ladybug. Fly away home. Your house is on fire. Your children are burning.”  I wonder if the first few pages would have held my attention if I hadn’t known already about the fire.

Lost in the Smoke

The effect is dizzying. The reader is trying to gain ground and understand this horrible event. When Cudjoe reaches Philadelphia, fire-related details begin to seep into the narrative: “[h]er other names are smoke curling from smashed windowpanes of the house on Osage.” But the language is metaphoric and little concrete information is offered about the causes of the fire and why the police shot those escaping (the bare facts of this information are obtainable only from the second half of the book or the book’s jacket).

Stonewalling the Outsider

Cudjoe asks people all over West Philadelphia for their take on the fire and for information on the whereabouts of the boy who escaped. However, the people in the neighborhood know he has come back from outside and don’t want to rehash the story with him or with the reader peering in from outside (a reader is more than an abstract concept here; Cudjoe tells them he is writing a book).

When Cudjoe tries to insert himself into this world that he’d been away from, the inhabitants like Margaret Jones resist him: “[s]he knew he’d been away…and that distance bothered her.” She will give him vague anecdotes about the leader of MOVE but even less information on the boy, Simba. The reader feels the role of the outsider as well, Margaret Jones says, “[w]asn’t any trouble till people started coming at us” and Cudjoe and the reader are more people coming at them, disturbing the status quo, “[w]e’re not looking for help from you or nobody else…Somebody called himself helping is the one lit the fire.”

The Facts Seep In

Information is offered about the aftermath of the fire itself: “the boy was last seen naked skin melting…A sharpshooter on a roof…The last sighting reports the boy alone.” It is clear at this point in the narrative to Cudjoe but not the reader that there was a fire on Osage Avenue started to get rid of the group MOVE. Cudjoe and the reader know that the police shot at those escaping and that a boy was seen alive, but neither Cudjoe nor the reader know what happened to Simba. The reader is immersed in his quest, and every time Cudjoe approaches someone new the reader is as thirsty for information as Cudjoe is.

The Narrator as Outsider

It is an interesting premise to set a book inside a closed society. Usually, though, I would expect such a book to be narrated by someone who is inside the society and to gain a glimpse of the inside I would otherwise not see. Because this book is from the point of view of someone who is no longer in the fold, what I learned about West Philadelphia instead was how closed it is. It was much like seeing how tall the wall is rather than catching any clear glimpse of life beyond it.

The language was striking, but without facts to ground it, the words, e.g.: “it’s Technicolor high noon” became bricks in the wall separating me from this culture. I could see it and appreciate it but not truly understand what was going on inside. Wideman seems to be making the point that the actions of the police on that day are inexplicable but not unexpected to the inhabitants of West Philadelphia. As an outsider, I am left with an understanding of how different their world is from mine and reminded that there are never satisfactory answers in a case like the fire on Osage Avenue.

The Reader’s Expectations

What I learned from this novel is how easy it is to raise expectations for the reader. Humans (especially readers) are curious creatures and we are easily tantalized. In fact, I was so drawn in by the premise of this book that I allowed Wideman to illustrate for me the character of a neighborhood I wouldn’t have read about otherwise.

However, I felt unfulfilled at the end of the novel. I was hoping for some sort of redemption. I can accept the larger message that there is no redemption and no true comprehension of a case like this, but I still feel something missing. I don’t want to write too much with the expectations of a reader in mind, but I will keep it in the back of my mind as something to consider when I am revising.

My experience with this book was somewhat of a generational one. I’m told that the news events this book is based on made national news. I wonder if Wideman considered his audience’s familiarity with those events as he wrote the story.

Have you read this book? How did your knowledge (or lack of knowledge) about the fire affect your experience of it?

If this review made you want to read the book, pick up a copy of Philadelphia Fire from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Conscientious Listening: The Pleasure of Being Read to

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Being read to is a pleasure that most people will not experience after childhood. My father was an excellent reader. He did all the voices and never shied from long books (I’ve only ever “read” The Lord of the Rings trilogy with my dad pronouncing every word). Everyone should be read to as a child. But when was the last time you shared this joy with an adult?

Why My Husband is Reading to Me

My husband and I both love books even though we read at very different speeds. And with my terrible memory, by the time he gets around to reading something I loved, I’ve forgotten the best parts.

After buying the first book of Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s The Strain for his Kindle, my husband fell in love with the book. The thing about the Kindle is that until I get one, I can’t read the book unless I steal his. And I’m still really devoted to paper books. When he offered to read the book aloud to me, I was gobsmacked and grateful.

We’ve spent subsequent evenings in the living room (that’s what we call the room without the TV, even though we hardly live in it) as he reads eagerly on. He’s pre-reading the book because he can’t contain his excitement, but also because it’s difficult to do a cold reading aloud. Some nights he reads to me when we get home and again after dinner. One night he read straight through for almost two hours until he was hoarse and I made him stop.

I am loving the attention and the time together. I’m loving our discussions before, during, and after.

How Being Read to is Affecting My Writing

Being read to is changing my relationship with language. I look at words day and night. I read. I edit. I write. I move commas and think about substituting words. I dread an especially long paragraph in a dull book and count pages until the end. I sneak peeks of endings.

I can’t do any of these things when my husband is reading to me. Instead, I watch his mouth forming the words and I encounter the words in a space where I can’t see them. I see the pictures the words are drawing (I’m sure Derrida or Foucault would have a more intelligent way of describing this). Having him read to me is helping me engage with the story (and especially the imagery) in a different way.

When it comes down to writing, I feel freer. I can focus more on what the words are supposed to do than on what they are. I know that I remember the trail of biological matter swept across the inside of that plane rather than any of the words that were specifically used. As a writer, words are my tools and they are important, but I feel like sometimes I oil and polish my screwdrivers without ever actually putting them to proper use.

The Problem with Books on Tape

The one way that many adults still experience being read to is through books on tape. My husband and I have shared the joy of being read to during road trips. We’ve listened to mysteries and classics from readers good and poor. Listening to The Lord of the Rings while crossing Utah even changed the geography I associate with the books.

Books on tape are a great way to experience a book when you are doing something else. Except that we are always doing something else. They work for me on road trips because there is the meditative quality of driving. But I can’t imagine listening to one in traffic. And when I’ve tried listening to books while gardening, my mind is equally split between the two tasks.

The problem with books on tape is a problem with the listener (me). In this busy, busy life, it’s hard to imagine allowing myself to sit still and focus on the story when I know my hands could be doing something else. When my husband reads to me, I can appreciate the gift of energy he’s putting into storytelling. I try to repay him with the gift of attention.

Reading to My Husband

I may have started this whole reading aloud thing last summer. We were waiting in a backyard hammock for a meteor shower and I was as restless as usual. I went inside and grabbed The Arabian Nights and started reading him stories. We haven’t gotten very far in the months since, but I hope soon to return the reading favor.

What I Want for You

When my husband started reading aloud to me, I justified the guilty pleasure with thoughts of all the readers Jorge Luis Borges must have listened to after he went blind. I wondered if that was part of the genius of his writing. But there should be no guilt in sharing a story and I’m eagerly awaiting my next chapter.

Here’s your homework. Ask someone to read to you. Or read to someone else. You don’t have to start with a full novel—a short story or poem will do. If you have kids, read to them but also try this with an adult. Recapture the magic of oral story telling. Reencounter language in its many forms. Relate to another person by share the special gifts of attention, time, and story. I hope reading aloud will bring you as much pleasure as it’s brought us.

If this review made you want to read the book aloud, pick up a copy of The Strain from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Cormac McCarthy, Optimist? Considering The Road

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the road - cormac mccarthyThe first time I picked up The Road by Cormac McCarthy, I read it almost straight through, and I was devastated by the bleakness of the post-apocalyptic world. The second time I read it, I leafed through its pages to see if I could find hope among the ashes.

Is The Road the Most Depressing Book Ever?

On re-reading this book, I realized McCarthy actually treads a careful line with The Road between despair and hope.

From the very beginning, he plays dark against light. The first sentence speaks of “the dark and the cold of the night” and then how the man reaches “out to touch the child sleeping beside him.” Together they are experiencing “Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone before.” And then McCarthy writes again of the child and his “precious breath.”

As a reader I was teetering between the sadness of the world and the possibility that maybe they could survive and remake the world.

McCarthy continues this precarious balance throughout the book and the juxtaposition kept me in tension. One scene shows “old crops dead and flattened” and the next “dreams so rich in color.” Beneath burnt orchards lie bunkers filled with food.

I started to realize that though I remembered the darkness of the book, there was a great deal of light in it. As the man says, “This is what the good guys do. They keep trying. They dont give up.”

Spoilers Ahead

Death is a continued presence in the book. Whether it is implied like when the boy asks, “Are we going to die?” and the man’s response “Sometime. Not now” or the less subtle bodies hanging from rafters or the baby roasting over a fire.

The man’s slow decline into death does not come as a surprise. But really, death (usually in less colorful ways) is a constant presence in any life. In fact McCarthy is dealing with a normal element in any normal parental relationship—parents always hope their children outlive them. The only difference is what the parents expect to die of and how soon.

The man and the boy make some really stupid mistakes throughout the book. First of all, they stick to the road. Then wander blindly into choke points like bridges that could easily be traps. They get their food stolen. And somehow they survive. It’s as though their lives are charmed (at least in comparison to some of those around them).

The Children Are Our Future

The greatest hope in The Road is the child. The father protects his son and dedicates all his resources to the child’s survival and happiness. He gives the Coke and often his food to his son. “The boy was all that stood between him and death.” Even as he is dying, the father insists that the boy “carry the fire.” He tells his son that he’s “going to be lucky.”

It is possible to imagine any surviving family units playing out the same struggle to save the life of the child. This is signaled when the man remembers a scene with his own father when they had stood at the same overlook when he was a child. History repeats itself in a way, even through great world changes. The child is the future of our species.

But the child is more than just a genetic continuation. The narrative speaks more than once of the fire that the child carries. I believe that fire to be the fire of civilization. What leads me to believe this is how the father focuses on daily survival, while the child is the one who sees beyond himself to ask, “What are our long term goals?” The child the one who insists that they feed Ely. He thinks of the other boy.

The child is generous and conscientious. He can afford to be because he is protected. We, in our daily lives where a traffic jam seems like a struggle for survival, would do well to remember what the stakes really are and to spend more time thinking about humanity.

The End

I cried my way through the last twenty pages of this book, again. So in that way the book was still devastating. And then there was the interlude with the trout and “the vermiculate patterns [on its back] that were maps of the world in its becoming.” It was a beautiful paragraph, but it did not fill me with more hope than I already had. In truth, all that paragraph did for me is make me want to re-read the ending of A River Runs Through It.

So is McCarthy an optimist? I don’t know if I would go that far. But his view of the world is much more complex than I originally gave him credit for and I was glad to find that we had some common ground.

This post was inspired by a couple of late night conversations with my tribe of writers. As always, I am grateful to them for their community and to my husband. Each of them helps me search for what is important in writing and in life.

If this review made you want to read the book, pick up a copy of The Road from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.